Fab series that shows how too many suits result in poor performance. The insights to the management, team and drivers was fantastic. There needs to be more episodes and series
12 Reviews
Awesome series - just not enough episodes
theotherpaulburne16 December 2018
Good start but like McLaren, needs work.
wt-446633 March 2018
Good show overall but needs some tuning. Would have loved to see more of how raw it really was. More like NFL's Hard Knocks. You could barely feel the disappointment that McLaren dealt with last year. This team truly worked their guts out to make "Chicken soup out of Chicken shit" and it was some what down played here. You don't really feel how frustrated the drivers and the top 3 really were. That was watered down.
I did enjoy seeing the internal workings of the organization or the amount of what it takes in this day and age to run an F1 team. Would love to see a comparison with say a NASCAR or INDY teams. That is a Racing Fan perspective.
Overall, good stepping off and hope to see more of.
I did enjoy seeing the internal workings of the organization or the amount of what it takes in this day and age to run an F1 team. Would love to see a comparison with say a NASCAR or INDY teams. That is a Racing Fan perspective.
Overall, good stepping off and hope to see more of.
quite entertaining for casuals
vampy8112 February 2018
I follow the F1 racing scene casually. Meaning that i enjoy watching the races, but i am not deep into the material. So for me it was a quite entertaining look behind the scenes. I can understand that a die hard fan would be underwhelmed and give it a lower score.
The technology center in Woking - England, where the car is designed and built, is simply impressive and has a very clean look. I would work there, too :)
With only four episodes it is very easy to watch. If you liked the first one, then the rest is a nobrainer. I watched it in one sitting. I really appreciate, that it is NOT a PR Commercial from McLaren. You notice that they made a lot of mistakes during the build of the car and the executives adress them. You can feel the frustration of the drivers after the first tests on the track and the poor performance of the car.
If you're into sports documentaries give it a go!
The technology center in Woking - England, where the car is designed and built, is simply impressive and has a very clean look. I would work there, too :)
With only four episodes it is very easy to watch. If you liked the first one, then the rest is a nobrainer. I watched it in one sitting. I really appreciate, that it is NOT a PR Commercial from McLaren. You notice that they made a lot of mistakes during the build of the car and the executives adress them. You can feel the frustration of the drivers after the first tests on the track and the poor performance of the car.
If you're into sports documentaries give it a go!
So fun to watch
vesperlyndbond10 May 2018
Loved it!
Julien061106 March 2018
Champions To Back Markers
iquine27 February 2018
Warning: Spoilers
(Flash Review)
Why would McLaren create a documentary about perhaps their worst season ever in Formula 1? To save face and the place the blame of their failures 90% on their embarrassing, in every way, Honda power unit. For those who follow F1, McLaren was a laughing stock across the paddock in 2017 with many races early on having Fernando Alonso's car retire after its engine/power unit puked up internal fluids. This documentary provided great insights and behind closed door perspectives on what an F1 team does to prepare for the upcoming season and was nicely edited to highlight the excruciating angst the team went through getting to the first race. More unique footage than I've ever before seen from the plethora of F1 footage I've viewed. Watching Alonso's wheel come off in the first testing day of 2018 hopefully, is not a sign of things to come.
Why would McLaren create a documentary about perhaps their worst season ever in Formula 1? To save face and the place the blame of their failures 90% on their embarrassing, in every way, Honda power unit. For those who follow F1, McLaren was a laughing stock across the paddock in 2017 with many races early on having Fernando Alonso's car retire after its engine/power unit puked up internal fluids. This documentary provided great insights and behind closed door perspectives on what an F1 team does to prepare for the upcoming season and was nicely edited to highlight the excruciating angst the team went through getting to the first race. More unique footage than I've ever before seen from the plethora of F1 footage I've viewed. Watching Alonso's wheel come off in the first testing day of 2018 hopefully, is not a sign of things to come.
Surprisingly Bland
mformoviesandmore10 February 2018
Perhaps this was aimed at people who don't follow F1. For those who do it was a superficial review of problems from a year ago.
Purportedly a behind-the-scenes look those shots were carefully planned and orchestrated.
We see some engineering outputs. Some carefully constructed sound bites. We don't see passion.
Given that MCLaren is now led by a marketing man perhaps we should have expected this approach. But I didn't feel any more connected with the team at the end of the four episodes than I did at the start.
That might also be why they have had trouble finding a title sponsor. Everyone knows what McLaren once was. It's not so clear what someone gets today.
Like the team, the documentary could have been a lot better.
Purportedly a behind-the-scenes look those shots were carefully planned and orchestrated.
We see some engineering outputs. Some carefully constructed sound bites. We don't see passion.
Given that MCLaren is now led by a marketing man perhaps we should have expected this approach. But I didn't feel any more connected with the team at the end of the four episodes than I did at the start.
That might also be why they have had trouble finding a title sponsor. Everyone knows what McLaren once was. It's not so clear what someone gets today.
Like the team, the documentary could have been a lot better.
Who's really responsible for this?
arnoldweissberg17 March 2018
I got the feeling that this was supposed to be a longer series that was going to celebrate a newly triumphant year for McLaren after two years of disaster. But when it didn't turn out that way they just cut it to four short episodes with a lot of hoopla about the launch. To have made this an effective series you'd need to show the letdown that followed, but the show just skates over that. In short, some bits for the F1 fan like me, but not enough, and not enough drama for the non-fan viewer, so really not very good.
Weak and unsatisfying
john-147-38192013 March 2018
Warning: Spoilers
This has the feel of a well-intentioned project, gutted and edited into near pablum by lawyers and the Marketing Departments at Honda and McLaren. Not to mention whatever entity owns the rights to F1 footage of which there is maybe 15 seconds in the whole thing. And I say "whole thing" advisedly as they stretched like crazy to make this into a 4 part series. I suppose McLaren should get some credit for allowing it to be shown at all, although one could argue that it serves them well to put all the blame on Honda's engine. The filmmakers should get a lot of credit for the very hard work of being there at critical moments to cover several story lines, probably shooting over a hundred hours of video, and shouldn't be blamed for the show getting its balls cut off (if I may say) in the editing room. There is fascinating footage of race car testing, lots of not so fascinating footage of driver gym workouts, way too much of McLaren HQ, but again ZERO footage of the racing that is supposedly the point of all this nonsense and piles and piles of money.
Tell us something that we don't know ....
AllanWB11 February 2018
This four part documentary is basically a McLaren marketing ploy that lays the blame for the last three years fiasco clearly at the feet of Honda.
Four really abysmal twenty minute episodes that are clearly not aimed at F1 fans and didn't really tell me anything that I didn't already know.
It seems to me that after the ousting of Ron Dennis the team is now being administered by 'marketing managers' rather than racers. This cant be good for the worlds number one motor sport.
Dreadful, really, really dreadful.
Four really abysmal twenty minute episodes that are clearly not aimed at F1 fans and didn't really tell me anything that I didn't already know.
It seems to me that after the ousting of Ron Dennis the team is now being administered by 'marketing managers' rather than racers. This cant be good for the worlds number one motor sport.
Dreadful, really, really dreadful.
If You've Never Seen DTS You Might Think This is Good
brent-30218 December 2021
I suppose if it was 2018 (the year before Drive to Survive was released) I might think this was in interesting behind the scenes look at an F1 team. Fernando Alonso is barely in this, despite being one of the top drivers on the grid at the time this was filmed. Instead the 4 episodes are weighted towards Stoffel Vandoorne, who ended up being a huge disappointment and has largely been forgotten.
The fact that there are only 4 episodes suggest to me that this series got a deal for a 4 episode "pilot" and once Amazon saw how boring it was they declined to pick it up for a full season. I know that they likely spent a tidy sum on the pilot episodes, but for the sake of pride they should have deleted this series from their library once they saw Drive To Survive.
The fact that there are only 4 episodes suggest to me that this series got a deal for a 4 episode "pilot" and once Amazon saw how boring it was they declined to pick it up for a full season. I know that they likely spent a tidy sum on the pilot episodes, but for the sake of pride they should have deleted this series from their library once they saw Drive To Survive.
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